Now you can just install the latest Wine version from it’s repository:

deb http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt jaunty main

Install wine

This post explains how to apply the fix and contains a basic overview of the game. Please keep in mind that I’m not that experienced yet with the game.

The texture fix

There is something wrong with the S3TC support of Wine for this game or something wrong with the S3TC support of the game in such a way that it only glitches in Wine.
Anyway, the bug is reported in Wine bug #12560. Unfortunately the status is still at NEW.

The bug causes the map to be unreadable and misrenders the borders of the in-game windows; you can see the results in the attachments of the bug. If you want to have a readable map, which is very, very useful, you’ll have to disable S3TC support in Wine. Someone at the Wine Bugzilla called heema created a patch for 1.1.14.

What you have to do is download the source, edit the code and execute the regular ./configure, make and sudo make install chain. If you don’t want to patch, because the version of Wine you’re using is too different or you’re just not confortable with patching you can also do it manually:

After unpacking the source, open

src/wine/dlls/wined3d/device.c

and search for

                 } if (destFormat != srcFormat) {
                     FIXME("Updating mixed format compressed texture is not curretly support\n");
                 } else {
                     GL_EXTCALL(glCompressedTexImage2DARB(glDescription->target, glDescription->level,
                             glDescription->glFormatInternal, srcWidth, srcHeight, 0, destSize, data));

Comment the last two lines — the function and method calls in the else block — out. You could add

FIXME("Perfect World has got no S3TC support in Wine");

after the commented lines to make it easier to find back and to locate in terminal backlogs.

Now open

src/wine/dlls/wined3d/directx.c

search for

         case WINED3DFMT_DXT5:
             if (GL_SUPPORT(EXT_TEXTURE_COMPRESSION_S3TC)) {
                 TRACE_(d3d_caps)("[OK]\n");
                return TRUE;
             }
             TRACE_(d3d_caps)("[FAILED]\n");
             return FALSE;

or something similar and replace the return TRUE; statement with

return FALSE;

That’s it! Now you’re ready to compile and install the program. Thanks to the commenters on the bug for the patch!
Note: the patch I linked to was written for Wine 1.1.14, but since 1.1.15 has already been released I’m not sure whether it still works.

International against Multilanguage Service

Originally the game was developed for the Chinese market. Next to the Malasyan version there are two other versions of the game that are English or have English support. These are Perfect World International and Perfect World Multilanguage Service. Perfect World International doesn’t target the international market, but just North-America. Perfect World Multilanguage Service targets the European market and currently only supports English, although more languages are expected to be officially supported after teh announced updated at 28 February.

The quality of the translations in Multilanguage Service, MS, is sometimes of a Babelfish-level. However, I find it worth the more players there are online at times that are sane for European beings. If you are interested in the game I would pick the version targeted at your part of the world.

Basic game overview

The three races of the world, Humans, Untamed and Wing Elves, live in a world created by a god called Pan Gu that has decided to retreat from ruling the world. Furthermore the Humans and Winged Elves are restoring their powers after they stopped the internal wars; there is something much important to focus on together: the wraiths, remainings of evil creatures that were the result of Pan Gu’s first attempt to create life. They managed to escape the deadly tsunamis he sent to the world to erase them all before the three new races remained. The wraiths have now returned and are slowly capturing terrain.

Grinding is also in this game the way of gaining levels, but fortunately there are enough quests to cover this. It still takes some time before you reach the max level, about 120 if I’m correctly in the International (or was it Chinese?) and 80 at MS.
Wars consist of PK’ing — player killing — level requirement 30 and scheduled territorial wars between guilds or factions — depending on the translation. Guilds get protections money from the terrains they’ve occupied. Money can also be obtained, next to items, by fighting in arenas against other people or monsters.

Although war is limited to certain places and times, I still like the game. It’s mostly because of it’s great world and the possibility to fly. Winged Elves have wings from their character birth and can fly. This costs mana in the International version, but doesn’t in the MS version. I don’t know if that’s deliberately or caused by a bug. Other characters can fly after they’ve reached level 30, Humans with magical swords and Untamed with beasts.

I won’t be playing this game that often, but I like to play it casually, something that’s probably perfectly possible because of the scheduled wars. I wouldn’t know what they’re like though, since I’m just level 24 I haven’t experienced any fight yet.

Regnum Online

Regnum Online is a free-to-play MMORPG, developed by the Buenos Aires based NGD Studios, has support for Windows, Linux and Linux 64bit. I’ve been playing the game for quite a long time now and like it, although it certainly can be improved.
The developer generates income with premium items, which should not influence battles.

It is a classical fantasy-medieval MMORPG, there are three ‘realms’ fighting each other.

Hebred fort

Syrtis is the realm of the elves, half elves and the human race Alturian. Although the lore says it is a woodland, the NPCs are afraid of the forests and even though there are indeed a lot of trees, green plains take the most space. They are portrayed as the just and defend themselves against the Ignis whome they’ve driven away after they started to do nasty magical things with dead people. It is a republic.
Alsius is currently the realm with the lowest population and is the home of dwarves, utghars — a furry terrible snowman like race, referred to as goats — and the human race Nordo. The lands are mountainious and partially covered with snow and pine forests. The lore doesn’t seem to be able to decide whether they fight to expand their empire or just to defend themselves from the other two realms. They got involved in the war when their king was murdered, no one knows who did that.
Ignis is the realm of the bad guys. After they were expelled by the Syrtians they went to the desert and murdered the people who used to live there. Another race joined them and now the ‘dune sea of Ignis’ is home to Dark Elves, Moloks — large humans with tatoos and dreadlocks — and the human race Skelic. They hate Syrtis and their aim is to bring the whole world of Regnum under their control and spread their religion.

Initiation and zones

Syrtian beach in the South.

When you create a new character, up to three are allowed or six with a premium item, you start in the first of the three zones a realm possesses: the Initiation Zone. No enemy should ever be able to come here and the monsters don’t attack you if you don’t hit them. With the help of quests the game mechanisms are explained and you’re introduced to the world. There are two ways of gaining the experience necesarry to obtain another of the 50 levels: killing monsters and doing quests — that most of the times also include killing monsters. Some people would call it a grindfest. It is not that bad, but indeed you have to spent a considerable amount of time killing monsters, a process that can be shortened by buying XP Boosters with real life money.

Fortunately you don’t have to worry about grinding yet at the Initiation Island; most of the time the quests will do. When you’ve reached level 10, which you presumably do quite fast, you get a quest that takes you to the mainland. That’s zone two and only when another realm manages to break the gate of the great wall separating you from the war zone — where everyone can come, the different zones are connected with non-capturable bridges, two to each other realm — enemies can come here.

Classes

It is now that you can choose your subclass. But let me explain all the classes at once. When you created your character at the beginning you already had to pick a class.
There are three main classes:

• Archer
• Mage
• Warrior

I think the names are clear enough, but keep in mind warriors have absolutely no range — apart from some spells, more on those later — and that mages rely a lot on mana — more on that later too.

Archers can choose between these subclasses:

• Hunter
• Marksman

A hunter can have a pet, can track for enemies, can turn invisible and has a passive speed bonus. However, it can’t do a large amount of damage on itself. The class is very powerful when player right, but it can be frustrating if you’d like to do something fast.

A marksman is mainly focuses on doing damage. Each subclass gets two new spell tabs, mages get three for their subclass, and the two of the marksman are all about doing damage. They also have a range passive.

Mages can choose between these subclasses:

• Conjurer
• Warlock

A conjurer is a healer, it can give health, revive people and give mana — essential for casting spells. There is a also a variant nicknamed the warjurer, when a conjurer puts points in Staff Mastery — a general mage discipline — and uses a summon, which is conjurer specific. Not all people like this and frown upon this. They think all conjurers should be dedicated to their true task: healing and support with additional buffs. The conjurer has a bad defense.

A warlock is a damage dealer, it can do tons of damage. However, whereas a marksman has still got a reasonable defense, the defense of a warlock is bad. It has some crowd control spells and spells capable of killing an enemy within seconds. Very powerful, extremely powerful when player right.

My brother at his graduation.

Warriors can choose between these subclasses:

• Barbarian
• Knight

A barbarian is also a damange dealer, its defense isn’t as a strong as a knight, but it can do massive amounts of damage at once and give speed up a group. Also has crowd control spells. If you don’t handle this class when it’s running towards you, you’re as good as dead.

A knight is a defensive type, capable of resisting a lot of damage. It has buffs to protect allies and can do some decent damage as well.

Spells

Lets explain something more about the spells I keep talking about.
Next to your base damage, the attacks of your bow, staff or dagger/spear/rapier/mace/etc you can do additional damage or achieve certain affects — like invisbility — by casting spells. Casting spells costs mana, and mana regenerates slowly.
All classes get four tabs with spells when they start and you get two tabs when you pick a subclass. Mages get three.
Each time you gain a new level you get skill points and spell points. You can put points into tabs to gain more spells and with spell points you can improve the effect of spells.

The game has more things, but I won’t write about all of them; you can read a more detailed description at the website: http://www.regnumonline.com.ar/